These conversations are endlessly fascinating...and this one in particular pulled back the curtain on "writing as a business." It reminded me of sitting through product review sessions when we were doing new season planning--it wasn't enough for a shoe to be beautiful, it had to sell....and no matter how much a designer might have loved their baby--the sales/marketing teams had to believe it had a place in the market.
Perhaps this is different in the uber literary world...but in the bookclub/upmarket world--it makes sense. And covers = packaging.
Same conversations/challenges we had--just a a different industry. As I'm overly fond of saying--business is business no matter what you are creating. (Doesn't mean that's right or good--it just is.)
I really love your insights from the business world, Diana. It's neat to see where the parallels are in the world class shoe market and the world class fiction market--not a connection I would have thought of! I completely agree with your astute assessment that this does matter in the book club/upmarket world.
This was such an insightful conversation! Thanks for sharing it! It's so interesting to hear how it all works, and it makes me so happy to see how excited the editors get too! <3
There ought to be an automatically generated transcript from Substack… lemme find out where they hid the button for that when they redesigned these video posts. (Just woke up here on the West Coast, will get back to you!)
Ok I found it (sort of). On the web version, there's a "Transcript" button under the video and headline but before the post itself. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be a "Transcript" button on the Substack app. Is that helpful? I'm sorry they redesigned things and made it harder to find!!
Very cool to get this behind the scenes look, thank you!
you’re so very welcome, Sophie!
These conversations are endlessly fascinating...and this one in particular pulled back the curtain on "writing as a business." It reminded me of sitting through product review sessions when we were doing new season planning--it wasn't enough for a shoe to be beautiful, it had to sell....and no matter how much a designer might have loved their baby--the sales/marketing teams had to believe it had a place in the market.
Perhaps this is different in the uber literary world...but in the bookclub/upmarket world--it makes sense. And covers = packaging.
Same conversations/challenges we had--just a a different industry. As I'm overly fond of saying--business is business no matter what you are creating. (Doesn't mean that's right or good--it just is.)
I really love your insights from the business world, Diana. It's neat to see where the parallels are in the world class shoe market and the world class fiction market--not a connection I would have thought of! I completely agree with your astute assessment that this does matter in the book club/upmarket world.
This was such an insightful conversation! Thanks for sharing it! It's so interesting to hear how it all works, and it makes me so happy to see how excited the editors get too! <3
Thank you, Kali! I also loved finding out that the editor and the whole team celebrates on pub day. It really is a team effort of booklovers!
Hi Evelyn, would it be possible to include transcripts of the episodes?
There ought to be an automatically generated transcript from Substack… lemme find out where they hid the button for that when they redesigned these video posts. (Just woke up here on the West Coast, will get back to you!)
No worries! Thank you!
Ok I found it (sort of). On the web version, there's a "Transcript" button under the video and headline but before the post itself. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be a "Transcript" button on the Substack app. Is that helpful? I'm sorry they redesigned things and made it harder to find!!
Yes, that’s very helpful. Thanks for taking the time to check!
Love this! So interesting. 🫶🏻🤩
Thank you, Elaine!